Zappa (6)

“FWIW, Joe’s Garage is probably one of my favorite albums, and I absolutely hate parts of it, too. But it was very mind-opening for me when I was sixteen, moreso than the early Mothers albums or fusion stuff or post-Demento crap etc. New [Janelle] Monae reminds me of JG in weird ways — self-consciously flimsy conceit keeps getting in the way, mildly amusing in-song narrative codes as filler but oddly necessary to the character of the album, a couple of highlights that have nothing to do with the framing stuff, fussy funk-rock, busy enough to require close listening to really appreciate how big and hooky (and not in need of “close listening”) it also is — but I probably won’t put in enough effort to really understand it (Monae) better or make the comparison work. But maybe I’ll read something about it that sends me back a few more times.”

– Dave Moore draws an intriguing comparison between Joe’s Garage (which I’ve listened to very little of) and the new Janelle Monae album (which I’ve listened to absolutely none of).

“_____________ is probably one of my favorite albums, and I absolutely hate parts of it, too” is an entirely useful — perhaps absolutely necessary — way to start a piece about Zappa.

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15 thoughts on “Zappa (6)”

Two more critics who like Zappa: Mark Perry and Ben Watson. Except I’ve never read what either has written about Zappa, just read Perry saying in Sniffin’ Glue that he likes the guy’s music. Watson’s written a book, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics Of Poodle Play.

Oh, Watson’s book is absolutely central to my understanding of and interest in Zappa – that, and his many podcast conversations with Bob Dobbs about Zappa/Marx/McLuhan – all of which I’ll hopefully get to eventually. Surprised about Perry, though I’m not sure why (I know of him what most people who don’t know much about him know of him; that he’s the guy who started Sniffin’ Glue).

Closer to our own small corner of the rockwrite universe, Jeff Pike’s a fan, too, I’m pretty sure.

Anyway, my first thought was, that makes sense in a way, because I can definitely hear traces of the early Mothers in a song like “Part Time Punks,” the gleeful, sped-up satirical edge of the thing (“but only when their mom’s gone out!” totally has a Zappaesque quality) – shit, might even be an answer record of sorts to “Flower Punk.” But then I remembered that was Television Personalities, not Alternative TV. Still — glad it made think of the connection.

My comment has two links (one on “Alternative” and one on “TV”), which may be more than WordPress is comfortable with, presumably on the lookout for spam. (Btw, the text, at least on my browser [Google Chrome], shows no indication that there are links. You have to accidentally hover your cursor to find out.)

I think comments boxes function differently (not as much flexibility) as main body posts. I don’t think the coding/”a href” thing works the same way it works in the main body (unless, because I’m the administrator here, it does?).

Yup, no underlines on “TEST LINK” (in the previous comment, I mean) – but the link is there. That’s why, in WP comments boxes, I usually just paste the link somewhere so it’s obvious to whoever’s reading. (In the main posts, it works more intuitively, and yeah, it underlines all links.)